Lewis Hamilton followed up his win in Austin last Sunday with a strong performance in practice for the Brazilian Grand Prix season finale.

The McLaren driver set a fastest time of 1m 14.028 to head championship leader Sebastian Vettel by 0.274 secs.

Having set the fastest low-fuel time on the medium tyre, his performance on the long runs also looked good, however he did give the tyres a breather from time to time, which he will not be able to do in race conditions. Rivals did unbroken sequences of laps, so the picture is not as clear as it may look. It seems that the Pirelli tyres are blistering in the heat, with track temperatures nudging 50 degrees. This would push teams into making two stops on Sunday, however the latest weather forecast suggests that Sunday will be wet, with rain starting to fall on Saturday evening after qualifying.

“It’s been one of the best Fridays we’ve had for a long, long time,” said Hamilton. “We’re certainly looking strong, but this place can be so tough on tyres that it’s hard to make any accurate predictions at this stage.

“The track and ambient temperatures were so high today that it felt almost as though I was sliding around the track with the tyres melting! Having said that, our long runs are usually tougher on the tyres [than shorter runs], but our long runs still looked quite good today.

McLaren has set itself the target of a 1-2 finish this weekend, which would give them second place in the Constructors’ Championship ahead of Ferrari, worth an extra $10 million to them compared to third.

Hamilton ran a higher downforce set-up on his car in the afternoon session than team mate Jenson Button, who started the afternoon session with low downforce and as a result had a straight line speed advantage of 11km/h over his team mate. However Button will need to improve from his 8th place today if he is to give McLaren a big payday on Sunday.

Mark Webber set the third fastest time, with Felipe Massa again faster than team mate Fernando Alonso, who was fifth. Ferrari looked like they have the speed to qualify on the second or third rows, but they will be wary of Button and the Lotus cars improving one lap pace tomorrow in final practice.

Ferrari split the work load on long runs, with Alonso running the hard tyre and Massa the soft. This will give them plenty of data to work with when planning Sunday’s race, although if the promised rain arrives it will be academic.

* This morning the teams tried out an evaluation specification of the 2013 Pirelli hard tyre. The tyre, which will have an orange sidewall, was close to the current hard tyre on performance, but has a different construction to even out the temperature across the tyre.

“We wanted to give teams the opportunity to try out our tyres before the first official test in February next year,” sad Pirelli motorsport boss Paul Hembery. “So that they can start to understand how the new tyres interact with the current cars.

“The initial feedback we received has been very positive: the tyre that the teams tried today has a different structure with a faster warm-up. This delivers extra performance within a wider working range, due to increased cornering grip.”

Perhaps the FIA should institute a "minimum salary" that teams must pay to their drivers. Other sports have minimums (my example is the NHL, wherein I think any player, even minor-league call-up's, will make a minimum of $450k USD).

Sure, this wouldn't stop pay drivers per se, but if the min salary was significant enough, teams would want to make sure that they have the best drivers available.

Some of us are British, but we like Mr Vettel as much as anyone, this is the year he has really impressed me, he has had some proper races and has come out on top with a car that at times has been only marginally better than people he has passed. Before it looked like a Playstation game with the cheats on, this year it looks like a lot of great racer and a good car.

button is so far behind because lewis is a much beter driver he is a racer.never really rated(understeer) button when he won his title he didnt win it the car did any top driver in the car would of won easy.we will see next year how fast button really is against perez.i will bet him to beat button everytime.lewis is something special like vettel and alonso.also we will see how good rosburg is next year.gonna be very interesting.

"Did you read the title' .. why do people feel its okay to be rude on the internet? my comment is very much based on fp1 &fp2 times as they are continuing on a common trend of buttons season. I then mention other races in response to people defending buttons times based on the fact it's just a practice session.

Button had the slimmer wing for a low-downforce set-up. You Hamilton fans are always dissing Button. Yet, everybody (except Ham fans of course) knows Button is a better and more consistent all-round driver. Jenson as the lead driver will take the Mclaren team to more titles without the baggage of Hamilton bringing the whole team down. Face it, Button will go on to be recognised as one of the all-time greats, Hamilton will remembered as a one-hit wonder. He's not in the top-level class of Alonso, Button, Vettel, Riakkonnen.

So Button and Raikkonen are not also "one hit wonders" then? Both kind of lucked into a championship albeit in different ways. Hamilton will be a big loss to McLaren. Just look at the points difference and the number of wins this year with a temperamental car.

I'm a mclaren fan and prefer JB but there is a problem if you look at JB over the last few races you would say mclaren have a car problem. If you look at Lewis you'd say mclaren have the fastest car. So how will they know the out and out speed of the car next year when they have 2 drivers not known to have the raw pace of lewis no matter how good a racer they may be.

Ferrari, Mclaren, Williams, lotus, and sauber all get "Legacy payments" along with their championship winnings. Ferrari do get more than anyone else but they have been in the sport since its inception. i think they get 50 mil, mclaren 40 williams 30 and so on, don't remember exact numbers,

Also funny how the same people who criticized VET and dont want him to win WDC for not having proven himself on track in a slower car want ALO to win by other drivers dropping out. Why even bother having the races? Lets just crown ALO champ for this year and next while we are at it. Its a bit of a double standard. VET has to prove he is worthy while ALO should just be appointed champ.

I don't see any problems with that wishlist. There's certainly nothing to suggest he's not a fan! Every world championship, including this year, has been influenced by DNFs so what's unusual here? Seems like we've got a very nervous Vettel fanboy here!

Since the race environmental conditions are expected to be so different from the practice an qualifying conditions, any predictions about the race, likely to be raining, and very likely to include at least one safety car deployment, should be taken advisedly, and most.

Way to go Lewy!

For the contenders:

Vettel-Red Bull:

It’s comparatively straight-forward at Red Bull. Besides making what ever preparations they can for the expected cold, wet weather, they just need to get the best car they can ready and reliable for Vettel, then let him do his stuff.

Alonso-Ferrari:

It’s complicated at Ferrari; they have to gamble one way or another. Even in a best case scenario, Vettel gets a DNF, Alonso still needs to be on the podium to win the championship. If Vettel finishes the race, then Alonso really almost must have a win. It’s been a while. But Ferrari will do everything they can to win; expect the unexpected this weekend, expect bizarre happenstance; if advantage can be gained in any way, expect Ferrari to be making the most of it.

I think you can look on an Alonso victory in the championship to be the only thing that will keep Stefano Domenicali secure in his job for another season.

The changing weather conditions favour the bold, and whether deserved or not, Alonso has the reputation of making the most of all conditions. One way or another, Ferrari are going to have to be ready for any track condition, maximized for any track conditions.

The expected rain definitely could throw up surprises, but that 13 pt gap is BIG. And it's nothing like 2010 when Seb was 15 pts behind, as Alonso had Webber 8 pts behind, and (mistakenly, in hindsight) covered him in the race. Vettel only has to cover off Alonso.

The logical result of this season would be Vettel winning, in the winning car. If Alonso won, it would be a big against-the-grain win, Ferrari could even be 3rd in the WCC!

Winning a WDC without a WCC is rare enough (10x in 54 complete seasons, 1958-2011), but only twice has it happened that someone's won a WDC in a car outside the top two in the WCC. Those were:

1983 - N.Piquet with Brabham, 3rd in WCC

1982 - K.Rosberg with Williams, 4th in WCC

1982 was a totally upside-down year for F1 ... I doubt something like it will ever be repeated.

First of all, I really appreciate the thoughtful comment from someone who is paying attention and knows what they are talking about.

Also, totally agree that the Rosberg win was nothing short of weird; but it was a highly variable year, non? And we have just enjoyed a highly variable year.

This year, in fact was the best I know of, for F1 championship. And not only do I think Vettel_Red Bull deserve the championship technically, but spiritually as well.

Be that as it may, the race starts in half an hour, Ferrari are the drama queens of the grid, their, at least borderline, 'fanaticism' to win is legendary, and few keen observers would argue the point; so anything can yet happen, and it is TOTALLY possible that Alonso may yet win.

Hamilton has the bit between his teeth, for final Mclaren glory this weekend, and even if he were to end up behind Alonso and Vettel at the start, either would be foolish to battle with him, considering the bigger prize they seek. Be interesting to see if there's any of the "less expecteds", qualify on the front rows ( Massa, Maldonado, Hulkenberg, etc ). Wet race start, if it happens, is going to make it mighty tense and interesting.

Mcl must be concerned and anyone who thinks they are not is deluded! JB isa clever, quick driver with loads of experience. However his qualifying is not as good as others,FACT. Therefore he is always on the back foot in both set up and problems at the start. Facts speak for themselves, until JB can quallly better he will be unable to challenge for the championship. With LH you have a differant style of driver who CAN qualify at the front. This is therefore why he is always ahead of JB. Unless Mclsort this they cannot win the championships!